Every now and then, I like to relax a little, step back and take stock of some of the more ambitious US megaprojects that have lurched around us, and compare their baseline schedules with actualized or projected (by owner) dates. The recent passage of appropriations for the Department of Homeland Security, and the GAOâs continued folly over its proposed massive DHS/NSA campus, in Southeast, Washington DC., brought to mind this comparison of epic projects. Â Although never mentioned in project documentation, the NSA plans a huge data-center and “counter-intelligence” infrastrcture.
History of Ineptitude
For a little back story, the DHS was concocted in 2003, in response to 911. The consolidated headquarters solution, to provide a central campus to replace 50 or so satellite offices strewn randomly about Washington, DC, came in 2006. The former were outdated (2003) and dilapidated; some even had vermin infestations. All had over-market short-term rental contracts.
What better choice than St. Elizabeths Hospital, with its commanding views of the Potomac Valley, at the confluence of the Potomac and Anacostia Rivers? Except, that the âhood, Ward 8, is one of the most crime-ridden in the district (RCN17), which certainly concerns Coast Guard workers who had to commute to the way-station there ( lacks a parking lot, thus Coast Guard employees are encouraged to car-pool.) There is a large completed garage near the Coast Guard building, but that is reserved for future DHS employees, who will park their cars there, after the DHS building is completed (RCN 15).  The USCG in the thumbnail (TOP) complex resembles a military command center with green roofs (LEED Gold).
The sprawling site was originally/still known as the Government Hospital for the Insane, with its crumbling, historic frames, and rotting infrastructure that all must be meticulously restored and upgraded to LEED Gold Status. Somehow, its historical context strikes me as ironic. After fierce protests by local residents (three-year delay), costly litigation, and subsequent bullying by the Feds, it was agreed the 50 existing historic structures would be upgraded without compromising their architectural integrity and original fabric. Except, of course, the wrench in the works was that there werenât sufficient roads to service the campus â a $100M oversight.
Some basic facts about the project
- The original budget of $3.5B was revised to $4.5B. The agency cited âcost-escalation, and design changes.â
- The original schedule of 9 years was revised to 26 years, earliest
- Per DHS Majority of buildings are pursuing LEED 2009 Gold certification
Greatest Follies in Major Local & Fed Construction Scheduling & Planning
The 2011 schedule, below, susbsequently was pushed back a minimum of 6 years:
After years of dicckering around, the administrations masterplan petered out for real. Imagine if you overlaid the actual dates onto the DHS masterschedule below – bar-stack waterfall (slope of the furthest right end of bars stcaked) would more resemble high-tide at Cape Cod, and then add 7 years to that . The team expected to hit the ground running in FY11, and ride the wave into FY20. But the project foundered under the weight of weak leadership, and a poor site selection, and is likely to be scuttled altogether by the next change in administration.
Some $1.5B has been appropriated for the project, yet only a single structure serving the US Coast Guard, with only a 50 seat snack shop to boast, has been put into service. Wherefore the rest of the expenditure? I daresay in D&D, and development of the St. Elizabeths website, which has all project documentation in its archives.
How DHS St. Elizabeths stacks up
Needless to say, the project is very unpopular with everyone in Washington, and may very well be scuttled altogether. In 2011, on a whim, then-Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano indicated that St. Elizabeths âmay no longer be the priority at DHS,â (âDHS St. Eâs to be victim of budget axe.â Jason Miller and Julia Ziegler, Federal News Radio, September 8, 2011.
Perhaps Napolitano was more concerned with border patrol financing or maybe she was too tired of the glacial rate of progress, but she let it continue its death-spiral anyway.  Nonetheless, two-years later, she requested another $93M, before an Appropriations subcommittee. Understood, as is the fashion nowadays in Washington: all of a sudden the focus is cyberterrorism.
However; I stray here, or not at least until you compare the project to other long-term epic projects, and notice that it has the highest (65%) slippage rate, below:
Long-haul Projects
If we pit the biggest losers against each other, we begin to see a pattern of gross  incompetence and absence of leadership that more often than not has only to blame the politicians who orchestrated these follies.
             SAS: Second Avenue Subway, NY, NY,   ESA: East Side Access, NY, NY
Indeed, the DHS construction scheduling and planning escapade eclipses its once-thought more-infamous betters, thus making it the most epic dysfunctional master schedule ever drafted in this country. However; to its credit, it did not take the epic budget excess prize (can anyone guess which?). It makes me wonder if any CPM timelines were ever generated for these projects, or were there insufficient budget resources. If there were schedulers, did they take the fall? On some of these projects, schedulers were certainly expendable. Several of the above projects scrubbed their construction scheduling teams at least once.
I dont’ know about you, but it seems like the Fed takes a fairly cavalier and irresponsible approach to managing its construction mega-projects. To be sure, CPM scheduling is an afterthought, or may not even be implemented at all.  Nor do I find solace in the notion that the DHS St. Elizabeths is nothing more than a tax-payer funded sink-hole for an ill-conceived domestic spy agency.
Resources: RCN âReality Check Needed: Rising Costs and Delays in Construction of New DHS Headquarters at St. Elizabeths,â U.S. House of Representatives, Committee on Homeland Security January, 2014
Other resources, and further reading
http://www.stelizabethsdevelopment.com/master-plan.html (masterplan)
 answer to the question
Yes, at a whopping 868% overbudget, the Big Dig takes the prize hands-down. The largest highway project ever, also had the highest rate of overage.
